An operational methodology for applying dynamic Life Cycle Assessment to buildings

While the Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) method is a powerful tool for environmental performance evaluation, the current LCA methodology faces some limitations in evaluating environmental performances of systems with a long time scales, such as buildings. Building systems have particularly long lifetim...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Building and environment 2018-10, Vol.144, p.611-621
Main Authors: Negishi, Koji, Tiruta-Barna, Ligia, Schiopu, Nicoleta, Lebert, Alexandra, Chevalier, Jacques
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Building
Buildings
Civil Engineering
Climate change
Computer applications
Construction durable
Dynamic life cycle impact assessment
Dynamic life cycle inventory
Engineering Sciences
Environmental assessment
Environmental impact
Environmental performance
Innovations
Life cycle analysis
Life cycle assessment
Life cycle engineering
Life cycles
Literature reviews
Methodology
Parameter identification
Performance degradation
Performance evaluation
Resource consumption
Software
Sustainable design
Technological change
Time dependence
Toxicity
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Summary:While the Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) method is a powerful tool for environmental performance evaluation, the current LCA methodology faces some limitations in evaluating environmental performances of systems with a long time scales, such as buildings. Building systems have particularly long lifetimes as compared to other products or services. They are composed of elements that evolve over time and are characterized by time-dependent parameters. A literature review was performed in the aim of identifying the time-dependent characteristics of a building system at different levels: building technology level (e.g. technical performance degradations and technological innovations), end-user level (e.g. occupant behaviour) and external system level (e.g. infrastructures, energy mix, regulations). A new LCA framework including the time dimension, applied to a building system, is proposed. It involves operational and reproducible tools (computational software and databases) to perform effective temporal evaluations and incorporates dynamic Life Cycle Inventory (LCI, including the temporal evolution of a building system and of the related environment interventions, i.e. emissions and resource consumption) and dynamic Life Cycle Impact Assessment (LCIA, climate change and toxicity). To integrate the specificities of buildings in dynamic LCI modelling, different existing assets (at national and international level) in the field of LCA are analysed. This work proposes an original methodology for performing a dynamic LCA of buildings using new tools still under development. •We propose a methodology for realising time dependent LCA of buildings.•Advanced tools for dynamic LCI and dynamic LCIA are combined together.•Temporal characteristics were identified in all stages of building's lifetime.•Temporal parameters and specific data are collected in a dedicated database.
ISSN:0360-1323
1873-684X
DOI:10.1016/j.buildenv.2018.09.005